The superfluous is very necessary.

Necklace Revamp

If you remember the 90’s, you’ll be with me on this one. If not, read on to be amused.

In the late 90’s, I was flush with the success of having my first “real” job, no debt, and a $500 apartment which I shared with a roommate (oh, the days!). I found myself with a little money to spend, and a penchant for going out with my roommate to explore the best of Portland, Oregon.

One of the stand-out places of Portland was the Portland Saturday Market. My roommate and I liked to wander around there after brunch on Sundays, picking up trinkets and oddities, and shopping the surrounding antique and vintage shops.

In our trips there, we discovered a jewelry artist who was just starting out, working with semi-precious stones. I fell in love with her work. I bought six pieces of hers over time (I’m actually wearing one of her necklaces in my profile picture!), but the most memorable (and most expensive) was my first. This was during the time when everyone was wearing chokers and raisin-colored lipstick (my signature at the time was Raisin by Bobbi Brown), and I was no exception. What this jewelry artist sold me was a choker made of citrine, iolite and tanzanite on sterling silver wire. She deeply discounted this piece because I loved it so much and she just thought it was “made for me”, and she couldn’t imagine selling it to anyone else.

See–EVERYONE was wearing chokers with dangly bits!

The centerpiece of this choker was a hand-created wire and stone bit that bore a strange resemblance to a chicken’s foot, in my mind. The citrine stones dangled off it, and the largest citrine was in the middle of it. I wore this necklace to every fancy occasion I had at that time–whether it was going to the symphony or on a dinner date with my fella, I wore that necklace.

And then one day, wearing it around the house, it broke. And broke magnificently, spewing stones all over the carpet. I scrounged on hands and knees, picking tiny iolite pieces out of the carpet, putting them in a baggie so I could take it back to the jewelry artist to restring and revamp. However, going back to the market, we found she had moved to Vegas to make a go of jewelry full-time. I always had it in the back of my mind to get this necklace fixed, and I hung on to it.

I was talking to my friend Rebecca, who blogs at The Lipstick Gal, and makes beautiful custom jewelry, and I was mentioning this necklace of mine. She said “send it to me–I can fix it, but include all the pieces!” Well, looking at it, I realize that it is dated. I don’t want it fixed so much as revamped. But I’m not sure what to do with it! Rebecca agreed to revamp it, and asked for ideas. This is where I turn to you, my stylish readers. What should I do with these stones? I don’t want the chicken claw anymore, and there are some larger stones in that section, and matching citrine cut stones and iolite cut stones.

I’ve been thinking of a long lariat, kind of like this one from the Etsy store Stone and Sterling.

What ideas do you have for me? Please, leave me comments, descriptions, links to cool stuff! Help me revamp my necklace!

To go in a totally different way, what about adding a larger (much larger) stone at the bottom as a pendant, and using the stones interspersed along the way up with chain to break it up? This link would be for a basic idea only.